5 surprising things about Australia Zoo

I’ll spare you all another travel blog post about how awesome Australia Zoo is and instead focus on the 5 things that surprised me the most about it.

(But you should seriously check out this zoo in Queensland, because it is pretty freakin’ cool 😉)

5. It’s a looong hike to see the meerkats

I know you love meerkats – everyone does! But unless they’ve changed things around since I visited Australia Zoo last month, the meerkats are about as far away from the zoo entrance as you can get, which is really quite far indeed, considering Australia Zoo spans over 100 hectares.

Of course, the meerkats are well worth the wait, and you get to see a fair few other awesome animals along the way, including crocs, kangaroos, koalas, rhinos, tigers, and elephants… actually, you have to scratch that last one off your wish list and I’ll tell you why after this cute photo of an adorable little meerkat.

4. Where are all the elephants?

I didn’t realise this until afterwards, but Australia Zoo doesn’t have any elephants. That’s weird, right?

It turns out that Australia Zoo’s delightfully named “Elephantasia” enclosure is currently undergoing renovations. Oh well. There’s still plenty of other awesome things to see and do, including…

3. The crocodile show is actually kind of scary

A recent-ish study by the Charles Darwin University in Australia’s Northern Territory concluded that saltwater crocodiles are among the most aggressive creatures in the whole friggin’ world. I believe that now that I’ve visited Australia Zoo’s “Crocoseum” and seen one follow a park warden around at the live show.

I’m pretty sure if the person hosting the croc show had fallen over at any stage during it, they would have been croc chow and I’d be having nightmares for the rest of my life.

Instead, it was just heaps of edge-of-your-seat fun.

2. It turns out that tortoises are not boring after all

Surprisingly, tortoises are not boring! I caught the tortoise live talk early on in the day and I found it to be incredibly interesting, even though it did not involve any element of danger whatsoever. The zoo doesn’t rank it in its top 10 highlights, but I’d rank it in mine. I learned a lot about these creatures, which have horrible sight and can live for more than 100 years.

1. The otter show can be extremely raunchy

I feel so bad for the parents who gathered early to catch the otter show at Australia Zoo and then had to explain to their young children what that one otter was doing on the other otter’s back 😂

It was hilarious, and disgusting, and really not family friendly at all. But the rest of the show was great!